1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the conversion of food waste into animal feed, and more particularly to an improved means for the manufacture of animal feed employing as a principal constituent food waste.
2. General Description of the Prior Art
A most difficult problem facing urban areas today is how to dispose of food waste, and this term as used herein refers to animal and vegetable matter--that is, both material which was once a living organism and an animal in the broad sense, and material which is a vegetable, that is, organic material but not from a living organism. In past years, it was common practice and quite profitable to feed untreated "leftovers" to hogs and thus recycle the food waste. There were two distinct advantages realized from this practice. One, it produced meat for the table; and two, it largely eliminated the food disposal problem. Today, however, it is a well-established fact that such feeding of untreated food waste to animals is unsafe and only serves to spread diseases of both people and animals. Thus, many states have passed laws prohibiting this practice. The remaining problem of how to dispose of food waste without polluting wells, streams, or the atmosphere has grown to major proportions. Many solutions have been proposed, but perhaps the best answer is some satisfactory method of purifying and reclaiming this vital source of food energy. This "recycling" is in line with today's thinking about conserving our natural resources and at the same time improving the ecology.
Heretofore, many processes have been suggested for purifying, drying, and storing treated food waste from homes and institutions. Some processes involve the use of chemicals and rather complex operations, such as heating in a vacuum, which requires rather delicate control and measuring devices and consumes much time while processing limited quantities. In some instances, juices have been drained from the waste product before cooking, thus reducing the food value of the final product. In no known cases have others successfully determined a workable and economical system of manufacturing animal feed from table refuse or food garbage. The only known system that conceivably might do the job is a system for rendering meat, and presently such a system costs approximately $41/2 million. With such a cost, it cannot be economically employed for purposes of handling food waste in general and converting it to animal feed.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a practical and economical system for the conversion of food waste in general to animal feed. After several years of inventive effort, the applicants have determined such a system, and construction of systems are presently scheduled for two locations in the United States.
It is a further object of this invention to provide a system of the category described which enables the process of conversion of food waste to animal feed to be on a continuous basis, wherein the conversion process is rapidly performed with assurance that all bacteria is killed and still without overheating material.